Archive for June, 2009

From Bob Margo’s EH.Net review of North, Wallis, and Weingast’s Violence and Social Orders: A Conceptual Framework for Interpreting Recorded Human History:

In my book people are iconic if I can summarize their life’s work in ten words or less. North takes two: “Institutions matter.”

He adds: “The opposite perspective — viewed in isolation most institutions don’t matter much, being Harberger triangles and small ones at that — has its fans in modern economics. But North has convinced the majority of economic historians, a goodly share of world’s development wonks, and the Nobel Prize Committee that he’s right.”

This post is for devotees and fellow-travelers of the Austrian school. As some of you know I maintain an online bibliography of articles and books dealing with applications of Austrian economics to the theory of the firm (and strategic management more generally). Happily, this literature has grown dramatically in the last few years. Sadly, I have not had time to update the bibliography on a consistent basis. So, please send me your suggested additions and corrections (ideally with URLs). Self-nominations are welcome!

A selection of Kleins and Fosses at Gammel Torv in central Copenhagen (another Foss is in the background, hiding behind a lamppost, and the head of Clan Klein is behind the camera). No real reason to post this except to prove that Nicolai and I both smile occasionally. Note to colleagues at home: This is a business trip, I promise.

Following up my previous entry on cycles of statism, I ask next: How important are cycles of expropriation? Consider, for example, how Bolivia has nationalized foreign oil firms every 34 years. In the most recent round, the nationalizing decree read:

Consider that Bolivia was the first country on the Continent to nationalize ts hydrocarbons, in 1937 with Standard Oil Co, a heroic measure, and done again in 1969 with Gulf Oil, leading the present generation to carry on the third and definitive nationalization. (Supreme Decree 28701, Evo Morales, President, May 2006).

In an experiment with Marco Casari we find similar patterns under more “democratic” circumstances. You may download the paper here.

The new ISI impact factors for 2008 have just been released. There are lots of surprises this time. The biggest one is arguably that Organization Science is now out of the top 10 range, a long drop from its #4 status in 2006 (this sucks when you got two recent papers, one forthcoming and one R&R, at this journal :-( ). The second surprise, at least to me, is that the Journal of Management has made it to #5. One possible explanation is its rather influential yearly review issues. Another surprise is that Organization Studies, which was among the top 10 in 2006, has now moved down a lot to close to #30. The Journal of Management Studies, while not among the top 10 this year, has not been harmed as badly, dropping to #14. ASQ, once the undisputed top-management journal, is now #9. Less surprising is Academy of Management Review’s #1 position (it is usually among the top 3), and that the Strategic Management Journal is #4.

A new feature of the list is the inclusion of a five-year impact factor which, given the rather turbulent movements from year to year, makes a lot of sense (and which produces a rather different rank order from the above!).